A modern revolution: How Zimbabwe got rid of Mugabe

November was a time of celebration for the citizens of Zimbabwe as the brutal Mugabe era finally ended.

Mugabe’s failing regime caused continuous devastation; a lack of healthcare, minimum funding for the education system and underpaid doctors. This forced the people of Zimbabwe to strike and march for his resignation.

The former president was highly respected at the beginning of his 37 years in power, because of his victory against the segregationist rule in the 70’s, and winning the country’s first independent election in the 80’s. Several people have blamed his wife Grace Mugabe, also known as Gucci Grace for his downfall. The former first lady, who had hopes of succeeding her husband, had only one qualification for the role, being Mugabe’s wife. The news that Robert Mugabe had fired his powerful vice president, Emmerson Mnangagwa, which cleared the way for his wife, sparked immediate attention and her ambitions were impeded when the army seized power. The army insisted it was not a coup, though, it was quite clear, it was.

A week later former vice president Emmerson Mnangagwa, a 75-year-old liberation war veteran and stalwart of the ruling Zanu-PF party, nicknamed the crocodile has been appointed.

In his first speech on Friday at a graduation ceremony west of the capital, Harare, he announced his ambition to modernise Zimbabwe and fix the country’s failing economy. He said: “the world has grown fiercely competitive and Zimbabwe must learn to deliver finished products to markets and extract the most profit from the country’s natural resources.”
Despite his gravitas many people do not believe that he is the right man for the job. He has a fierce reputation, as Mugabe’s enforcer, he was also directly involved in the Matabeleland massacres of the 1980s, in which 20,000 killings occurred. Whilst many hold his past mistakes against him, others believe he will undoubtedly be a less awful president but, he is hardly considered a democrat.

Zimbabwe’s new President Emmerson Mnangagwa has named his cabinet, appointing senior military figures to high-profile positions.

As read on Times Live – Africa a major outcry surfaced from the youth and adult citizens of Zimbabwe stating that Mr Emmerson had made poor decisions on the cabinet positions, the education minister who was rewarded a cabinet due to his participation in the removal of Robert Mugabe has been dropped earlier today [2nd December 2017] due to the continuous outcries made by the people, in addition to this removal Mnangagwa has also taken action to remove primary and higher education minister Lazaraus Dokora after a number of people complained about his poor performance and undermining Zimbabwe’s education system.

Despite these changes there is no doubt that copious numbers of Zimbabweans are disappointed with the line up as they hoped that things would change and drift away from the Mugabe era.

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